Cornyn’s rape-kit plan wins final approval — as part of bill he voted against

In the end, Texas Sen. John Cornyn’s rape-kit legislation won final congressional approval without dissent today. But, in keeping with the bizarre ways of Washington, Cornyn’s coveted proposal was attached to a larger measure — the Violence Against Women Act — that the second-ranking Senate Republican ended up voting against.

In hailing House passage of his plan to reduce a nationwide backlog of untested rape kits, Cornyn didn’t mention his own recent vote against the Violence Against Women Act. Instead, he focused on the benefits of his bipartisan proposal, formally known as the Sexual Assault Forensic Evidence Reporting (SAFER) bill.

“I am pleased that Congress has passed this legislation that takes a significant step toward reducing that backlog and bringing swifter justice for millions of victims,” Cornyn said. “For far too long, an unacceptable national backlog of untested rape kits has compounded the pain for too many victims of sexual assault.”

Women’s groups and law enforcement organizations said Cornyn’s proposal was needed because of the large number of rape kits that have not been tested by laboratories, complicating prosecutions of some rape suspects and adding more frustration to the lives of rape victims.

According to Cornyn’s office, the proposal “will audit and reduce the backlog of untested rape kits sitting in the possession of law enforcement agencies across the country, which experts have pegged as high as 400,000.”

The San Antonio Republican said the proposal will not add to the federal deficit and will “provide funding for state and local governments to conduct audits of untested DNA evidence and create a national reporting system to help track and prioritize untested rape kits.”

The Violence Against Women Act was approved by a comfortable margin in the House today, although a majority of Republicans voted against it. Both Cornyn and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Houston, voted against it in the Senate. Cornyn said he voted against the Violence Against Women Act because he felt a provision involving crimes committed on Indian reservations was unconstitutional.